Mon Coeur Continuera
by Servant of SHEVAL
Summary: Sequel to E Vedrai Scrito in Core: 'Tu eil mio Amore'. Vincent Valentine was tired of darkness, but he knew that somewhere in this hellish landscape he could find the light... he just wished he could remember where. Slight DOC spoilers, Slight AU.
1. Prologue

**Author's Beginning Note Thingy: **You don't have to read the original first... though you will be confused. These two are going to be very different stories, if I can possibly help it, and so I doubt this one will get much notice. Nevertheless, I'm writing it. Hope you enjoy.

xxx

The horizon was pink, puffy and grey... rather like the sunset drawn by a little child, Vincent thought. Someone who had marked up a whole piece of white paper with a pink crayon, and then frustratedly scribbled pencil-dark clouds all over it, marring the gentle sunlight with the chaotic frenzy only a young hand could bring to such artwork. And though the horizon was far, far away, it couldn't have possibly had less depth to it.

Sitting on a high rock peak, staring out over the desolate desert landscape, he raised his shining claw toward the sunlight, trying to grasp it in his hand, but not moving those sharpened fingertips an inch. No, they were far too rough for a thing so delicate... so shallow, just like that piece of paper. One light touch and he'd tear it to shreds. He didn't want to see another sun go down.

But it did. It always did, and he consoled himself with the fact that it would rise in the morning.

A remarkable thing, the sunlight... he thought to himself, hopping off the rocks and plummeting to the ground below. He landed with a faulty skitter on the gravelly stones, sliding, stumbling, catching himself, and then going forward again. Among all the things that die, the sun is the only one that is reliably reborn, again and again, each day with all the glory of the last, if not more.

Most things didn't work like that.

Most things, _if_ they came back from the dead, came back a shell, a hollow shadow, empty and unlike themselves. He should have known, he'd done it many times before.

They were countless, the times Vincent, or someone else, had carved out a piece of him, took it or destroyed it somehow, and he always just left it. Never turned back, never cared to pick it up in case he needed it later. Just left a wet lump of person throbbing on the floor until its final light gave out, and he lost it forever.

Twilight was deepening... the ashy rocks were turning black and intimidating all around him, and he cowered slightly in their presence. Strange formations, huge, looming wind-shaped points and edges stood out like spires of darkness from the landscape around, and it gave him bad memories. He had to stop.

Night was settling in full, now, and so Vincent huddled up under an overhanging cliff, knees pressed tight to his chest, arms encircling them, holding his legs close. He shuddered. How could it do that? How could the sun just go on to the next day like the previous one had never existed? Like it _hadn't_ lost the day before to the sands of time, just like he was losing himself to the sands of these arrid desert winds?

What _was_ the sun's secret?

He longed to know. Vincent Valentine was tired of darkness, but he knew that somewhere in this hellish landscape he could find the light...

...he just wished he remembered where.

xxx

**Author's Ending Note Thingy:** I'm posting this now, while the original is still… newly-finished. There might not be updates for a while, depends on how well the inspiration flows… I've got some ideas, but my break's half-over, once school begins… work slows down. Anyway… hope you like!

P.S. sorry for the potentially crappy French grammar in the title this time, I used an online translator... and it's like the lamest title ever in English. XD I apologize, but I couldn't resist.


	2. A Sense of Obligation

Cosmo Canyon had very good scouts.

For such an isolated, remote colony, the village managed to be strangely up-to-date on seemingly obscure information about Planet, politics, and people. Anything, really. He never figured out how they did it, but Cloud secretly suspected that somewhere deep within the bowels of Bugenhagen's old observatory lay a huge, outdated supercomputer, hidden from the eyes of the rabid environmentalists and luddites that made up most of the population.

Whenever he thought of it, he mentally scolded himself for having such childish daydreams at the age of 31... but scouts only went to the borders, never beyond, and travelers didn't come often. Whoever was in charge no doubt had some highly restricted contact with Edge, or Healin... and Nanaki, of course, _was_ in charge. That alone probably put the machine-fearing populous to rest. Nanaki was a being wise and capable enough to bend technology to his own needs, to use it for good. Though in all his self-extinguished fantasies, Cloud never did figure out how the lupine animal ran that computer with his paws.

Six years ago the ex-Soldier had sought out an education here... Five years as a guinea pig in the laboratories left him much less intellectually developed and mentally matured than he preferred, or anyone else even knew, and working as a delivery boy turned out to be a lifestyle far more demeaning than even his small sense of pride would allow him live. So Cloud had made the only somewhat conscious decision to 'retire' to Cosmo Canyon for hopefully the rest of his life. Learn a little, perhaps find some way to be useful again. A world not in crisis was a hard place for warriors.

He liked Nanaki alot, the creature was good-natured and sensible, and said that Cloud would probably be a valuable asset to the Canyon, as well as capable of reaping some of its finer, and more obscure benefits. This mention being, no doubt, mostly in reference to the absolutely gigantic library on Planetary information that the village housed. It easily rivaled ShinRa's from back in the 'glory days' of the old electric company, and was a common haunt for the blonde when he wasn't busy learning from the elders. Each one had a particular expertise, whether in knowledge or in skill, and Cloud was hungry for all of it.

He'd fallen into the cycles of Canyon life quicker than perhaps anyone expected... enjoyed the long, lazy days, the bizarre moonlight rituals and festivals often held, the red sunrise, the cool rock outcroppings that smelt of dust, paper, and old bound leather tomes...

...but when Nanaki had mentioned Cloud being a valuable asset, he probably should've asked how...

But because he hadn't, now he was finding out the hard way. It meant that one day he would be standing here, sword in hand, at the curving iron gates of the cliffside city, against his will and at _the most_ inconvenient time...

The lights and the sounds were in back of him, a long line of girls dancing around a fire, the musicians playing out an enchanting tune. He'd been pulled from the midst of a festival by an urgently whispered alert, delivered to him by a young boy of the Canyon after his breathless flight up the entrance stairs. The boy hadn't told him much, but looked simply scared out of his wits, and scurried off soon after. With a sigh, Cloud embarked once he was given a solemn nod from the firetailed beast.

He felt ridiculous, wearing a bizarre mix of authentic Cosmo Canyon clothes, and his old fighting garb. There was a swirling, brown, patterned design drawn onto his cheeks that some cute girl had called 'henna' (for someone determined on knowing everything there was to know in Cosmo Canyon, Cloud found he actually knew very little about the place's culture), colored beads spotting his spiky hair, and ringed necklaces of feathers and stones slipping between the folds of his shirt. They felt cold, or tickled on his bare flesh, and these pants were way too wide for fighting.

He wondered for a moment exactly how the hell he'd gotten suckered into being 'border guardian' when that was Nanaki's job... Especially on this night, a celebration he'd been looking forward to for so long... Though Nanaki's uninvolvement was easily explainable by just that: the festival was in his honor.

Cloud thought that the animal looked quite surreal, decked out in a feathery headdress and painted leather skins draped over his body. There was something beautiful, primal, and regal about him as he sat there in the golden light of the fire. His single sulfur eye reflected the flickering Cosmo Candle, the sparks danced across his brazen jewelry, and smoldered in each glassy bead. But that sight lay away across the thick shadow, on the other side of the plateau. Cloud stood away from all this, isolated in the dark.

Squinted mako-blue eyes stared out over the dark horizon, segmented by plateaus and cliffs and crevasses of varying sizes. Somewhere out there was the 'shadow that ran like the sun from the night', as the scout's cryptic description dictated. Sometimes he dearly wished that these people could use _useful_ words like: 'creepy', 'fast', and 'black'. Either that, or that they would simply pay no notice to that telltale movement in the corner of their vision.

But Cosmo Canyon had very good scouts.

Step by step, he descended the long stairwell, ancient and smooth, carved out from the canyon wall itself Shiva knows how long ago. Step by step the light faded behind him, and his eyes adjusted to the change as he was swallowed up, no... walked willingly into the dark abyss below, the gaping mouth of the beast. Step by step he came closer to whatever it was down here that the frightened boy had deemed to be a threat.

The canyon took a breath as his booted foot hit bottom, sucking in a deep, chilling night wind, and then blowing it back out in a gentle breeze that ruffled Cloud's golden hair, and made the small beads clack against one another too loudly, giving away his position. He winced, and hoped that the volume of the sound had simply been exaggerated by its proximity to his ear... the resulting echo of clicks bouncing back to him proved otherwise, though there wasn't anything he could do about it.

Passing nimbly over the well-known path, Cloud dodged between the rocks, bobbed and weaved around corners and obstacles, made distance between himself and the bright city he had left, then climbed.

With little more than a rustle of wind through his mismatched clothes, and the scratch of dust beneath his boots, he landed on the flat top of a small mesa and looked down and around. His scope widened by the height he had over most of the landscape, mako-cultured eyes scanned all up and down the picture laid out before him, seeking anomalies, discrepancies... a burrowed hole, a misplaced boulder, a slash on the side of the wall or any signs of movement.

He was on his second pass, and preparing to simply get up and leave, before he saw just that. It was nothing more than a glint of metal by moonlight, but it was enough of a sign for him. He unsheathed his blade from its holder on his back, and held the light weapon deftly in his hands. Newly wrought from the seldom used fire of the Cosmo Canyon smithy, the balance of the weapon was remarkably good, and despite its size, the enchanted mythril was remarkably light, making for much more agile movements. The iridescence of the metal shimmered before him: the only warning that thing beneath the cliff wall down there would ever get.

With only a slight shift of his stance, Cloud propelled himself forward, rocketing across the gap toward the cliffside below and across the valley. His sword was held, two-handed, high over his head. This would only take one strike...

Yet as he went careening toward his target, and as it became more and more visible... a shadowed figure took shape: hooking claw, crimson eyes, its body like a tattered dark shroud... yet it sat huddled on the ground, not preparing to attack nor to defend itself against Cloud's onslaught. So he second-guessed.

With an awkward twist midair, he brought his feet down, skidding across the ground, his sword still up in the air. He wasn't about to bring his guard down, but this thing deserved more checking out. Once he'd steadied himself, the swordsman peeked past his arm at the thing on the ground. What he saw nearly made him drop the blade.

The thing down there was completely undisturbed, and didn't even seem to have noticed him as he landed. It sat perfectly still, but perfectly straight under the outcropping of rock. The cliff's shadow had been pushed back, _just_ behind him by the rising moon.

The muted tones of nighttime weren't enough to dull the vivid color scarlet of his cloak, but they accentuated the midnight of his long, tangled hair. The man, it was a man... no monster as had been described to him, was reaching a metal-encased arm up to the sky each of five sharp fingers closing lightly around the bluish orb that hung there as if it were as delicate as a bubble, floating compliantly in his grasp. A wistful smile twisted on his lips that looked afraid to be there... and slowly, slowly the clawed fingers unclasped, his hand grazing down the trails of starlight before coming to rest with its humanlike brother in his lap.

Dark lashes slipped closed, snuffing out the orange light of fragmented eyes as they touched down on his cheeks, pale and gaunt, smudged with dirt that hadn't been cared enough about to be removed. A shuddering sigh escaped him as his head bowed down, falling hopelessly to hang from his shoulders, as labored and as disturbing as a dying man's last breath.

With a hard swallow as he forced down the swell of unexplained urgency and pity in his throat, Cloud looked down at the man's hidden face reflected in the metal of his sword, and shakingly, disbelievingly called out, "Vincent...?"

xxx

**Author's Ending Note Thingy: **The better part of four days were put into this chapter... XD at first it wanted to come, but wasn't right, then it didn't want to come... and once I got it started, it didn't want to stop. My paragraphs in this one are freaking huge! Anyway, had alot of fun with it, have some ideas for later plot, which is good since I'm short of those! XD Hahah. Leave a review, and make me deliriously happy. Toodles.

More news. I did some editing… on things that seemed awkward to me. Also… people probably won't even see this update, but oh well. I have bad news.

My laptop, on which I was writing this fic, has died. The data on the harddrive was unsalvageable. I've lost three completed fanfic chapters, two from this very fic, one from my story 'Where Others Fail, Prevail'. This is a MAJOR setback… and with final exams looming on the horizon, there will be NO updates until summer begins… five weeks from now. I'm sorry, very, very sorry about this, but I AM NOT DONE. I WILL continue my stories, despite having lost key parts of them. Thanks for support/reviews/whatnot… yeah. That's it.


	3. From the Red Cliff of the Mountain

**Author's Beginning Note Thingy:** So here I go again... losing those two chapters I wrote has been very discouraging, this rewrite is nowhere near as good as the original... Nevertheless, I hope you'll like this latest installment, and please leave a review, if you can, it's infinitely more encouraging for me to write when I know I have an audience waiting for me.

xxx

"Vincent..." the boy breathed again, but his old companion was unresponsive. With a sigh, Cloud ran ring-decked fingers through his unruly spikes of hair, and flipped the sword around, back into it's loose scabbard on his back. He ignored a few of the smaller beads that had accidentally been pulled off the strands of blonde and rolled lazily about his feet. Kneeling beside him, Cloud looked over incredulously, attempting to meet the gunman's eyes.

He didn't succeed... Vincent turned away, the only reaction he'd gotten so far to even show the man was aware of his presence... which was progress, he supposed. Cloud decided, probably for the better, not to let his mind erupt into the multitudes of questions he had... he knew that once he got started, he wouldn't be able to block the flow, and he had a pretty good hunch, as well, that none of them would be answered any time soon. If his years at the Canyon had taught him anything, they'd taught him patience... even if only to a certain degree.

As it was, that degree was yet to be reached, and so he simply stayed there, at the side of his old friend, and only half-jokingly asked "Hey, Vincent..." his voice calm and even, unintimidating if he could manage it, "...you in there?"

A long, long silence followed, in which the swordsman fidgeted awkwardly, but pressed no further, giving the man his time to respond. At last, with painful slowness, Vincent began to look up, his eyes unfocused, darting around to follow things that didn't exist... Cloud knew what that meant... and in Vincent's case, it probably wasn't good...

"Cloud...?" the gunman at last mumbled, his pupils dilating and constricting slowly, still hazy and unfocussed and not _really_ looking at him.

"Yeah..." the swordsman breathed, reaching out hesitantly, but not making contact... something about Vincent's eyes. The yellow in them, he knew what _that_ meant too, and _it_ was worse. He knew better than to approach when the man's demons were aroused. "Yeah, it's me." he assured, "I'm here." _just give him his time..._ he told himself, _let it pass..._

The ex-Turk was moving like a film put on slow-motion, his facial expressions changing bit by tiny bit... from that terrifying blankness, to a faint recognition, and then an immense swell of relief. The man lurched forward, stumbling to his knees beside Cloud and half-falling, half-throwing himself at him, twining his emaciated arms around the boy's shoulders and burying his face roughly into his armored shoulder. "Cloud..."

The blonde gasped, flinching back at the sudden motion, an instinctual, fighter's movement that sent him to his feet with his arms spread wide, and Vincent crashing headfirst into the canyon floor. "Shit...!" Cloud hissed unintentionally, mentally berating himself for the unnecessary shy away from contact. _Damnit..._ his thoughts raged, _...damnit, why am I still so...? After all these years..._ "I'm sorry, Vincent..." he breathed, bending down over him and holding his arms out as if to pick the man right up off the ground and carry him away, yet he halted.

He couldn't help it... and yet his upper teeth slammed so hard into his lower lip out of sheer frustration that he could feel the pinched flesh begin to tingle almost instantly at the block of circulation. Wrong time. _Wrong time..._ he thought, _...wrong time, wrong time..._ he was sitting here and doing nothing at the _wrong time_ when he should be helping Vincent get back up.

But by the time these final thoughts raced through his head the gunman was already beginning to do so on his own... and the process was so terrible and captivating that, once more, Cloud was stunned into stillness as he watched.

Like a wounded animal, Vincent first reached his mismatched arms out over and in front of his head, clawing at the earth for a second before prying his face and chest up off the ground. He tossed the mane of dark hair haphazardly out of his eyes, but most of the stiff and tangled mess barely moved, and he didn't seem to care anyway. Next his knees inched forward, sliding along the ground one by one until his back was arched upwards again. He slowly padded back on his palms until he was vaguely upright, suddenly straightening, and teetering briefly, off-balance, he at last settled back into his original position.

"What's happened to you?" Cloud whispered under his breath, shaking his head disbelievingly and sighing out. This time of year he was beginning to see his breath again in the chill night, the vaguely opaque droplets of condensed fluid soaking up the pale stars.

Reaching down, he lay a hand gently on Vincent's back, the other palming the man's far shoulder, intent on assisting him in standing up. The ex-Turk shrunk uncomfortably between the swordsman's large hands, but nevertheless stood, staggering and hunched to detract from his full height. Beneath the veil of black that tumbled over his ragged red headband, the fractured eyes continued to dance about nervously, the eyes of a prey animal on the lookout for its would-be killer. Cloud couldn't imagine what he could possibly be Seeing, that had him shaken up so much. He knew the symptoms, and Vincent had them, but such a severe degree would suggest... he didn't know. He hadn't read that far into Cosmo Canyon's research and theories yet. Perhaps Nanaki would.

It was a sure verdict: he would take Vincent back to the Canyon with him. This late there was no other logical place to go, and, though he didn't know the depth of the poor man's distress yet, it was likely also the only place that could offer insight or any sort of solution. "I'm taking you up to the village." he quietly informed.

Vincent nodded numbly, now, apparently, set on remaining silent.

_Nothing sudden..._ his mind reminded, as he led Vincent, practically by the hand, down a rough and winding trail through the canyon, off the little cliff they'd until recently been sitting on, and back into the dark floor. He noticed bitterly the slight way the gunman cringed and drew nearer to him in the shadow, his breathing hitching fearfully. _...you know from experience, when you See, you're not in your right head..._ which was a grave understatement, he felt, in Vincent's case. _...and Odin only knows the kinds of things Vincent would be capable of if he felt threatened._

Needless to say, the long walk back was completed in utter silence, until at last, from out of the looming, blocky landscape came drifting the faint noises of music and laughter. Even this late the festival was still raging on... it was likely to last all the way to morning. Cloud found himself almost smiling hopefully... he did so want to rejoin the festivities, but... Vincent would _not_ be up to it. He snorted to himself quietly. Even when Vincent had his senses about him he probably wouldn't have been up to it. The gunman had never been the social type, after all. And he couldn't leave him alone, not like this.

It was bizarre, and yet somehow comforting, when Cloud looked again at his companion, to see Vincent's face turned up toward the sky, listening quizzically to the far-off sound. They were nearing the base of that last great plateau, and the light fluttered down to touch the pale contours of his face, shading it strangely. There was a childlike curiosity in his broken eyes, despite the distinctive lack of innocence that settled heavy upon the rest of him. The swordsman would have smiled, if it were not for the soft twinge he suddenly felt in the back of his mind...

_...no..._ his eyes went wide and moved to Vincent before following the man's gaze up the stone stairs leading all the way to the top of the canyon. _...no, not now..._

Gritting his teeth, Cloud involuntarily lurched forward and stifled a groan at the swell of dizzying pressure swept over him top to bottom. He was conscious, yes, of what was happening... but that didn't make what he Saw any less terrifying.

He flinched as a fiercely glowing blue assaulted his vision, temporarily blinding him, and threw an arm up over his eyes to block it while they adjusted. Once they had the amorphous haze of light at last began to take form... thin trails of silver arms reaching down from the pulsating moon. Each one terminated in a jagged claw, which reached out with outstretched talons for Vincent. The eerie glow made him seem even paler than usual, and yet at the same time very dark... as if surrounded by his own personal aura of shadow, which Cloud could See fluxing slowly around him, that the cold light could touch, but not illuminate, and at once he somehow felt that this was a good thing... to keep the prying moonlight out. It agitated something within Vincent, a small ring of what looked like shattered glass around his heart matching the beat of the moon, flaring up and fading down along with it, sinking, as if _wanting_ to be grasped by the reaching fingers.

And then... something else lay between them, a yellowy circle that seemed to be trying to wrest its way out of his chest, while Vincent, despite this all, remained stone-still, like a doll or a marionette on severed strings. That yellow glow, too, was reaching for something, and at last Cloud saw it...

Spilling down over the cliffside came a flaming waterfall, a lavaflow of golden firelight, no doubt from the Cosmo Candle up above... the purest, most gentle and calming light there could ever be... and it _almost_ put rest to Cloud's heart... almost. Because the silver-blue arms of moonlight had already wrapped themselves around Vincent's body, pinning his arms to his sides, growing over him like vines, thick and choking, and stirring the shards in his chest into blue flame... already the yellow glow was waning, and the spotlight of blue cast on the ground at his feet was acting as a barrier against the healing Candlelight.

It pooled thickly at the cliff's base and went oozing out, meeting the blue head on, warring with it. Cloud stood in the warmth, the false yet calming daylight, Vincent in the cold, separated. The two could not mix, like oil and water, and green static crackled on the threshold between them. Already the 'safe', golden light was losing the battle, and Cloud could see Vincent slowly being drawn away by the long arms of the moon, of the night... to where, he didn't know, but...

_No..._ it slammed against the insides of his skull, a single word, single thought screaming through his mind,_...no...!_ he would not lose him. He would not see his friend be taken away! He had to save him... had to free him! Darkness swam before his eyes as he felt his body jerk and move, it seemed, outside his own control. A sharp movement, a cutting movement... a flash of more than dark and he saw his sword passing through the beams of silver light. A loud metallic clang of steel on rock went ringing out into the oppressive silence, followed by a startled gasp. Cloud opened his eyes... his senses fluttering back to him at last. He looked down...

...his sword was embedded deeply into the rocky, tight-packed canyon soil hardly an inch behind Vincent's heels. The gunman stood forcefully upright, his bright eyes wide in fear as he looked back over his shoulder at the truly near-miss he'd just survived. Cloud drew in a shuddering breath and turned his gaze up to meet him, "V-Vincent, I..."

...but his words were grasped and twisted off there by that horribly familiar pinching sensation at the front of his mind, the pre-emptive buzzing in his ears, distracting from everything else, before all would go silent. _Not again!!_ he growled and wrenched his sword up from the ground, roughly grabbing Vincent by the wrist and ignoring the small sound of surprise, and perhaps even pain due to the incredibly strong hold he had on the frail hand. "Come on!" he merely shouted, bounding up the stairs that led to the village, dragging his companion along behind him.

It was good that he knew the way... for as he clumsily slid the sword back into its sheath, he used his now-free hand to cover his eyes, already closed anyway... just for good measure. He didn't _want_ to See... not now, not after what he'd just done... he'd come _so_ close, so terribly close to hurting Vincent just then, he couldn't risk a repeat of events, perhaps with far worse consequences. But he knew the village like the back of his hand by now, and could navigate it blind. So he just kept running, until the stairs stopped and he was on flat ground again. The music of the ongoing festival was almost completely drowned out by the incessant grinding sound, and his hand was so firmly clamped over his face that the light of the bonfire didn't even seep past the skin of his closed eyelids.

Out of nowhere, he collided with something. Bodies... falling... short shouts, women gasping... he'd probably just run straight into the dancing line on his way to the stairs.

"Cloud?" he heard Nanaki, his concerned, and yet also confused animalian voice, "What's going on?"

"Not now!!" he screamed, giving a sharp tug to Vincent who seemed to be trailing behind for some reason. The gunman gave a yelp and sped up as Cloud stumbled up the stairs. The heat in his eyes was terrible, he could almost feel them boiling with the vision's need to be Seen, his hearing became further muffled, his perception more patched and blurry. He could hardly feel the difference of passing out of the wet night air into the dry, warm outcroppings, barely recognized his own doorknob as he tore open the door to his house, and certainly didn't remember a single thing of what happened after he and Vincent tumbled inside, and his last thoughts fled under a thin quilt of darkness, pulled over mercifully dreamless unconsciousness.

xxx

**Author's Ending Note Thingy:** Inspired by JereduLevenin's most recent fic, Running Out of Time, a really excellent tear-jerker if you're into tragic angst (and on my favorites list if you're too lazy to search her penname or story title), I've decided to strive to make this fic non-shounen-ai. You hear what that means? THIS IS NOT A STRIFENTINE. It technically wasn't to begin with... but I started out giving myself the option of turning them into a pairing. Now I've taken that away. XD It's gonna be hard, since they're only my favorite pairing in the history of ever. But, fellow Strifentiners, do not despair! I can assure you much mush and hint-dropping nonetheless... that's just stuff I can't help but put in. XD I can only censor so much, after all... and nobody can stop me from claiming that it's all just platonic.


	4. To the Delirious Eye

Cloud gave a light gasp as he twitched awake, his skin peeling off the black leather of the couchcushions...

...the couch? Why was he on the couch? Groggily, the boy looked up, examining his current position. He was, in fact, splayed out on the sofa, a light blanket half-falling off onto the floor, but twined around his left leg, and therefore not having come completely off of him. He was still in his festival clothes... and fighting armor, for that matter, the rumpled, baggy blue pants, spotted with embroidered designs near the bottom, his leather half-skirt tangled with the fabric of the blankets even more than his feet were. The plain white foldover shirt, was sleeveless and edged in gold, hanging half-open over an exposed chest. Matching detached sleeves of the same style and meant to be worn with the shirt had been laced tightly around his upper arms last night, but now sagged at his elbows. The wolf-emblazoned shoulder pauldron was in its usual spot on his left, slightly askew from having been slept on… his leather gloves bunched at his wrists. Brightly colored beads were sagging off of his deflated hair, and he imagined the smeared brown patterns of henna were still faintly visible on his face.

Nevertheless... running a hand over his eyes, he continued trying to figure out why he was on the couch in the first place. He briefly noted the closed blinds, and commended himself for doing that much at least... he remembered leaving the window open and unshaded last night so that his home would soak up as much of the smoky campfire smell he loved as was possible. This morning, though, it was certainly a blessing not to have to deal with glaring sunlight.

Why, though, had he closed it? He could have kept the blinds up, and the sun would not have disturbed him if he were sleeping in his bed... Squeezing his eyes shut, he forced himself down into the murky pool of memories... and slowly, slowly they filtered back up to the surface towards him.

A square of silvery moonlight sat planted in the middle of the floor, and he'd wanted nothing more than to stamp it out, like a big ember about to light a grassfire. The only way to do that, though... he'd rushed over and haphazardly tugged down the shade, effectively blocking out enough of the terrible light to create a bridge across the middle of his relatively empty livingroom floor: a space wide enough for two to cross.

...two? And why the moonlight?

A flash. His sword cutting through ropes, cords of silver that weren't really there, a dark, scared form. Vincent.

Sitting bolt upright, _now_ he remembered... and glanced down the hall toward his room. He'd shut Vincent up in there after returning yesterday... or maybe it had been earlier this morning. A pang of guilt hit him square on in the forehead as he remembered the harshness with which he'd shoved his friend into the bed and slammed the door shut behind him, his only intentions being to safeguard him, at least for a little while, while his own vision passed. Apparently that had taken the whole night, or he dozed off sometime in between with his face buried thoroughly into a throw pillow to prevent the temptation of looking up and seeing the no-doubt distorted world around him.

And now it was morning, daylight, and safe, and he had no desire to let in the sun... what he could really use was a _gigantic_ cup of coffee... yet he lacked the motivation to move his leaden legs, get up, and make himself some. He found it damn near inconceivable to even wash off and get changed, though he supposed he desperately needed it. The parts of him that weren't decorated and temporarily tattooed were probably sweatstained... on _silk_. If Nanaki caught him with his ceremonial clothes in such a state he would never hear the end of it.

But speak of the devil, there came a dull scraping near the bottom of his door, a signal he'd come to recognize as the animal's coming. Claws on wood, the only means a beast without hands for knocking had of alerting anyone to his arrival, aside from verbally calling out, which he did do as well for good measure. "Cloud? Are you up?"

The swordsman groaned softly, wishing he could just lay back down and sleep the rest of the day away... knowing that was an impossible option, especially now that Nanaki's sensitive ears had certainly heard his complaining. There was no further prodding, however, from him for Cloud to wake up, and the blonde could even imagine the creature just sitting there politely, waiting for the door to be answered for him... as it would certainly have to be, since paws couldn't use doorknobs.

He groaned again with this realization: that he would have to stand up, and lazily struggled to his feet, "Just a minute." he nearly snapped, shuffling barefoot (at least he'd remembered to take his boots off) over the soft carpeted ground on his path to the entryway.

With a click of the lock and a slight tug of the door it opened just a crack, and Cloud, his work done, stumbled back toward the couch. Nanaki peered through the opening with his single good eye, and nudged his way in.

"That was quite a show we had from you last night, Cloud." the sarcasm wasn't meant maliciously, but the short and even tone Nanaki had to his voice meant that he was far from pleased with the swordsman's actions.

"I'm sorry." Cloud half-growled, flopping down heavily on the leather couch and hunching his shoulders, letting his head sink down as he glared out at the golden outline of the shaded window. He hated to apologize... not because it meant swallowing his pride (what little he still hand), but because it meant he'd done something bad enough to merit apology. It was the guilt that got him, and that thought sent him glancing down the darkened hallway toward his room, the shut door, Vincent in there.

"What did you See?" now the animal's voice took on a more gravelly quality. Ferocious and stern, and he turned his lazerlike yellow eye onto him to show he meant business.

Cloud, on the other hand, did not respond well to force, sighed, and leaned back, pressing his body fully into the stuffing of the backrest. "I didn't look too closely." he grumbled.

"Why?" Nanaki queried, sniffing almost imperceptibly, his gaze glistening over the small livingroom, scanning for anything that could be amiss.

"Maybe because..." Cloud paused and considered for the briefest of moments, before shaking his head and forging on, "...I was _afraid_ what I might See."

"More like afraid what you might _do_ when you Saw it." the beast offhandedly suggested. Cloud winced. Nanaki turned his red-maned head on the swordsman, looking him over. Cloud did the same. Nanaki, he saw, also bore telltale, leftover signs of the festival last night: chipped blue paint was still caked onto his fur in choice places: his snout, his back haunches, rings around his tail... and he still wore the shroud of tattered leather, though it was noticeably more frayed and beaten than it had been at the start of the celebration last night. "I went down into the canyon after you... left last night." the creature mentioned, padding slowly over to the window and nosing under the shade to look out, "I saw the sword-mark on the ground." he slipped back under and into the room, turning around to face him. "What did you See?"

The wince became a grimace as flashes of the readily-suppressed vision resurfaced like shark's fins around his mind. The grappling tentacles of moonlight, the war of silver and gold, Vincent caught in the darkness in between... He shook his head to clear it, and stuttered, "N-nothing... I mean... it meant nothing." he shifted awkwardly on the couch, crossing his arms over his chest, "The vision I saw meant nothing to me." he at last managed to explain.

Nanaki heaved a sigh that came out sounding more like a bestial hiss, and thwacked the shade frustratedly with his tail, which, in reaction, snapped up and rolled back into the top sending the blinding sunlight straight in, hitting Cloud in the face like a brick wall. He groaned and closed his eyes as the animal walked up, "Meaningless _only_ because you do not _wish_ to understand!" his voice then softened, sounding almost tainted with pity, "Cloud... don't you see? If you learn to _decipher_ the images, if you can decode them, you've nothing to fear from them..."

Something furry and warm brushed Cloud's knee, and looking down he saw that Nanaki had rested his chin lightly on it, looking up with a somewhat pleading gaze. "If you can understand them..." the beast went on, "...you may not have to learn to suppress them."

"But I don't want to understand them!" the swordsman snapped, slamming a fist down onto the couchcusion with a rather unsatisfying flop. He realized, dimly, how much like a tantrum-throwing three-year-old he must sound right now, but went on without a care, "I never asked for them! I have enough terrible _real life_ memories and images floating around my head that I'm _still_ trying to sort through, even after ten years! I don't need to See the things I See, I don't want to!" emotion flared in his voice at the end of the tirade, and with a frustrated groan the blonde leaned forward, planting his elbows firmly onto his knees with barely enough time for Nanaki to dodge out of the way, and cupping his face in his hands.

"...it's a shame..." the animal said after a long pause. Cloud didn't bother to look up. "...that you would waste such a blessed gift from the planet." he frowned and reconsidered, "No... forget I said that. Not waste... I..." he sighed, "I understand the trauma associated with having the Sight. Precious few are awarded, by the planet, the ability to see the truth behind these skin-shells we living beings walk in... but that truth, for some, is too shocking for them to handle. Many people, probably some that you don't even know of, possess the Sight in Cosmo Canyon... but almost all of them lock it away, learn to control it as you wish to. Those who embrace their gifts become... wise elders, prophets..." his voice took on a tone of admiration and nostalgia.

"I just don't understand why I'm having so much trouble doing that." Cloud broke in, looking up from beyond his hands. Nanaki was seated on the floor in the center of the light, looking as wild and simultaneously regal as ever. "If sixteen-year-old Shandra the innkeep can do it, if crippled old Matthias can at eighty-seven, why can't I? I'm a three-time world savior, for Shiva's sake, and only thirty-one." his voice turned desperate as he gently lowered his face back down into his palms, "What the hell is keeping me from blocking it."

For the longest time Nanaki didn't answer, just sat and breathed heavily. "I just thought..." a hint of regret crept into his voice as he finally spoke, like a child who'd just realized their hero was not quite as invincible or amazing as they'd originally thought them to be, "...that a person as strong and worldwise as you would not have been satisfied with further deception... would have _wanted_ to See."

"_Existence with a wall is better, we consider, than not exist at all._" Cloud rambled bitingly.

"Don't quote at me." Nanaki scoffed, "Your far less well-read than I am." a point of pride on the animal's part. "_To flee from memory, had we the wings, many would fly._" he demonstrated, lightly stepping up close to Cloud again and tilting his head with a clack of beads, as if trying to meet the man's eyes by boring a hole straight through his hands with his sharp stare. "But you know all about that, Cloud?" it was not a question. "You know you cannot run forever."

Dropping his hands and glaring evenly down at the beast, easily matching his heated look, Cloud frowned, "I'm sick of this." he spat, "You can't force your bizarre esoteric talents onto me if I don't want to have them. You've already said... plenty of people at the Canyon suppress their Sight their entire lives and never have a problem."

"But you were meant for greater things than being an innkeep or a half-senile old cripple." The animal seemed completely unphazed by the swordsman's scathing frustration. "Please, Cloud... _I'm_ not the one who's forcing you. It's no lack of skill, I think, that keeps you from controlling your Sight. You're quite qualified, in my mind, to be able to do so... but the planet is stubborn, and I doubt she will give up this fight so easily. There is something you are _meant_ to see, and she will have you see it." his voice was lighter now, meaning he was satisfied with such a conclusion to their otherwise impassioned and even bitter conversation. He nuzzled Cloud's knee again sympathetically and looked up, youthful mischief gleaming out of his eye.

It was often very hard to remember how a creature so wise and noble could still be, at least by his race's count of years, so young. Cloud often forgot that Nanaki aged and matured differently... how old was he now, pushing sixty? How much life did that mean he had left? About four times what he'd already lived, he guessed. And how long did he himself have? Maybe twice as much. It was a dark path that he tried not to let his mind wander down during the grateful silence that strung between them in that moment. He let his own remaining doubts drop behind sealed lips... he knew they would resurface later in some other heated exchange between himself and his self-assigned mentor. For now, the quiet and the comforting warmth of his friend nearby was enough to sate him as he lazily ruffled the auburn mane atop the creature's fiery orange head.

At last, Nanaki stiffened and looked up. "I smelled it earlier." he mentioned, standing and straightening his back, "But we got caught up." an almost apologetic glance over one shoulder. "Vincent." he mentioned.

Cloud tensed at the word, and turned his gaze down the hall... no windows down there. It was still shaded and dark, and he winced slightly at the thought of that. "Yes..." was his only answer.

"Where is he?" asked the beast.

"In my room." Cloud replied softly, "I... didn't have time to..." he fidgeted, "...last night, before I... fell asleep."

Nanaki hid, relatively well, the slight eyeroll as he started across the room for hallway, his body angling back and forth with an animal's grace. Cloud watched from his seat for a long time, before at last forcing himself up to his feet, and diving out of the harsh light. By the time he reached it, Nanaki already had a furry ear pressed lightly against the wood of the door.

"I don't hear anything." the beast mentioned.

"He's probably asleep." Cloud shrugged.

"No..." Nanaki shook his shaggy head with more jingles and clacks resounding from last night's forgotten beading and adornments, "...we spent nearly a year adventuring with him, I know the sounds of when Vincent sleeps... his breath, his body movements... he would be dreaming, making noise, if only slightly. I mean I don't hear _anything_, and the only time he's completely silent..." the creature brought his voice down to a gravelly whisper, "...is when he's awake." Eager and curious, Nanaki sat back on his hind legs briefly and pawed at the doorknob. This one, unlike the one at the main entrance, was not a simple round ball, but a somewhat artfully swerving handle which paws could grip and turn with relative ease…

"No, wait!" Cloud hissed suddenly, his own hand darting out and pushing Nanaki's away to keep the door closed.

The animal looked confused, but waited for Cloud to offer the explanation…

"Vincent is…" the swordsman sank back thoughtfully, into the cool, pillowwy enclaves of his memory until he hit a jagged shard within it. His wax-statue-like stillness, his… smallness, curled and hunched as they tunneled through the dark, the rusted claw raised to the moon, his bone-pale face and those torpid eyes… Cloud flinched. "Something happened…" his voice was low and apprehensive. "…he's different, he's…" he struggled to find the right explanation, "…not himself."

Nanaki slowly nodded, instantly understanding, and inched away from the door.

"He barely recognized me last night." Cloud said distantly, straightening and staring directly forward at the door without really looking at it.

"It's been ten years, Cloud," the animal mentioned, "and you've changed alot. I'm not entirely surprised he didn't recognize you." the eye ghosted over the blonde's bizarre and mismatched getup, and his lips quivered into a brief smirk. "Especially given the circumstances."

Cloud's eyes, on the other hand, darkened as he spoke. "I haven't changed nearly enough..." he sighed. "Still, though... I think it…" words came haltingly, "…might be better if… you don't go in yet." he looked down at Nanaki, who again seemed confused. The boy offered a sad smile, "…just a feeling."

An animal himself, Nanaki new better than to mistrust Cloud's frighteningly accurate intuition, and further backed away. "Do you want me to look into it?"

The swordsman choked on a laugh, "I don't know what you do or how you do it…" he began, running a hand through his hair, sending more baubles tumbling off the spiky mop onto the floor, "…but whenever you 'look into it' with anything… it always seems to work." he sighed and his shoulders sagged tiredly, "Yes, Nanaki. Do whatever you can."

The beast nodded and turned away, starting off for the exit, "I'll get on that." he informed quietly on his way out, "But you do what you can too, Cloud." he paused right before the door, looking back to make sure his message was understood, "You say he recognized you… that's a start. Remember that at the moment we know nothing but what your own observations have told you, yet I'm sure… contact of any sort can help. Vincent was never social…" another laugh bubbled feebly and died in Cloud's throat, making him have to swallow down dryness, "…but a little bit of… _humanity_ might very well help right now." and clawing open the doorway, Nanaki stepped out.

Cloud let out a heavy sigh and leaned against the far wall, his hands jammed into his pockets, tracing the patterns of the wood grain on the door in front of him with his eyes. After a few minutes of absolutely unhelpful thinking, he stepped forward and extended his hand. Who knew what he would see or See in there? Who knew what was wrong with Vincent, if it was still wrong now, or if it had been merely a temporary bout of… whatever, insanity, perhaps, last night? Who knew what he could do to help his friend? Who knew? But there was only one way to find out…

He pushed the door open and stuck his head inside. "Vincent?"

xxx

**Author's Ending Note Thingy:** Totally crappy ending, I know... uhm, oh well. Yeah, no-one's reading this fic anymore... XD or at least no-one's reviewing... Maybe I'll do a repost, I dunno. Anyway, this is officially into new territory again, I've written farther than I had back before my laptop died, so... yaaay! I'm happy with it. Hope you guys are... So anyway, is this getting confusing enough yet? XP I tried to explain it as best I could, I'll fill in a little more later, I suppose. Anybody recognize the quotes Cloud and Nanaki use? XP If you do, you get a cookie! In other news, I'm going camping... I leave tomorrow. I know my updating schedule has been patchy at best, but you can be sure I won't be so much as thinking about writing a new chapter for two weeks. Nevertheless... hope you liked this chapter, hope you come back for the next one, taa.


	5. With Drowsy Head and Folded Wing

Night passed slowly, excruciatingly slowly for Vincent. He sat where he had been left, huddled in the center of the bed. His skeletal wrist throbbed with a bruise from where Cloud had clutched it, dragging him into the shelter of his home, throwing him through the door and onto the high mattress where he now was. The door clicked shut behind.

And so here he sat, in silence... always in silence. The sheets had been askew even before he'd landed on them in a heap. Now his knees were drawn up close to his chest and his arms linked around them, holding them in like he was trying to fit himself into some sort of egg. Night passed slowly. The silver fingers of the moon stretched and lengthened, rotating like the hands of a clock across Cloud's bed, moving as time went by, but always completely enveloping Vincent's personal spot. He stared out the window, deaf to the noises below, and blind to any sight outside but the moon... a forlorn familiarity was in his eyes as he stared at it, a longing desire to retrieve something that had been lost... but the moon was a mere replica, and not the real thing itself.

That is what kept him in his seat. That is what stopped him jumping out the window with his arms outstretched to receive it. He'd tried that once before, once since... But it hadn't worked. All he'd gotten was the sick sight of blood and too many broken bones to run away from it. He couldn't fly anymore.

The moon set and he shivered in the terrifying dark and the cold. It was familiar, again, in a distant way... like _he'd_ never seen the dark, but someone else had, and told him about it. But he _had_ seen the dark, and that was why he was afraid.

Then something wonderful happened. Off in the Eastern horizon the grey-blue sky turned lavender, then pink, and then erupted into gold. The sun was rising. Every shining ray that fell through the window and touched him straightened his back, lit color in his pallid face, and brought strength back to his feeble, frozen limbs, healing him... by the time it was done, Vincent seemed practically a different person. He was a mirror, reflecting the day-star's light, or glowing with one of his own... gold reinforced by gold so that the shine was all the stronger. At last he had the energy he needed to meet the light, head-on... the energy he didn't have in the nighttime, the energy that barred him from the moon. It was a bit more than an hour high when he at last regained his senses and got out of bed.

Where was he? Slate blue blankets, black curtains, and red-rock walls were unfamiliar to him... His eyes hovered around the room, searching with a Turk's skill of observation, searching for clues. Furniture was sparse and simple, a few shelves hung off the undecorated walls, and these were packed with numerous volumes, all utterly mismatched in size, age and subject, though the gunman didn't look too close. Books? No, he still couldn't think where he was... There was a desk likewise piled high with books, and a small candle lamp. Then, by the door, was a wide cabinet, hanging open. Inside was hung a large and familiar-looking sword beside and empty stand where, he guessed, another weapon was normally supposed to stay. Drawing closer, Vincent's lips curved around the words as he read aloud the names scrawled across brass plaques on ebon wood. The one sword was "First Tsurugi", and the empty stand read "Ormen Lange".

There was a good hint. Only one person he knew could lift a weapon so huge... but his eyes were still drawn down to something else. A small chest, cracked open, a multicolored glow filtering out. Carefully he reached down and pushed the box the rest of the way open. Materia.

He cringed at the sight of it and stepped away. Yet... the teal hue of the support materia was not the same ice-blue color of the moon, and the dandelion-yellow command was different than the pale gold sun. It was close, the resemblance was _close_, but at the same time dissimilar enough that he could bear to be near it, and so Vincent knelt down before the box to inspect.

Slash All, Ice, Elemental, Lightning, Shiva... he needed to look no further, knew beyond the shadow of a doubt who the gems belonged to. They were Cloud's. It was not only the selection, the very same set that he'd always seen the boy use, but the shape, the luster, and the sound of them... He didn't know how he knew all this, where the sudden expertise had come from... Vincent tried not to question anymore, because often he didn't like the answers. On top of it, though, he didn't understand how the mysterious knowledge he had could help him connect the jewels to _Cloud_ specifically. Nevertheless... it was like the trademark of a craftsman, and it was left all over them. These materia were Cloud's, Cloud had made these.

So he was in Cloud's room... wherever it was. The man glided to the window, his movement at once jerky and awkward, and eerily smooth. He approached, curling his fingers up on the sill to peek like a child over the ledge. The village down below was still sleeping in from the night's festivities, and the signs left behind by them were all around. The red, sandy ground was spotted with banners, ribbons and flowers. All the homes he could see were lined up around a descending ramp that curled around the mountainous structure in which this room was also built. The level floor outside stretched out and disappeared over the lip of a plateau into a winding scarlet canyon.

Now he knew. Now he _remembered_. Over a month ago he'd left Edge... a steel spike of memory slashed into his face, a jagged edge before a great gap, and with a whine he backed away from the bright window and toppled over onto the bed again. There he stayed while the pain of stinging and sudden-ending remembrance dulled down. He had it all, though. All of this memory, at least: over a month ago he'd left Edge to try to find Cloud... and ended up here, and _had_ found him. Was it coincidence? Luck? Or had he known Cloud was here in Cosmo Canyon, and that was why he had come? _This_ he couldn't remember... but not because it had fallen off the twisted metal side. The thought was there, embedded in his head, there was just no way to call it up. It was locked tightly in an unfamiliar and sunny-colored box that he didn't have the key to, yet.

Whispers. Whispers breaking into the room from outside the door. He was still, still and silent, and then there was scrabbling moving away, and more silence...

The door cracked open and a familiar voice hailed him, "Vincent?"

He stared up, frozen, rather like a deer in headlights. The door kept creeping and creeping and creeping... and there he was: Cloud, standing there, weary... that about covered it. He just looked tired.

Something clicked inside Vincent. Slowly, without speaking, he rose from the mattress and floated over, arms outstretched as if meaning to cradle the boy once he reached him. "Cloud..." he hummed, the usual fullness of his voice at once returning. There was air, there was space there, between his words... they didn't grind together like rusted grates. There was room. He beckoned to the bed, "...you should sleep."

The blonde just stood there, momentarily transfixed, looking somewhere between surprised and impressed at Vincent's rather motherly request because 1) it was very unlike him, and 2) he had not yet, since they met up again last night, uttered a single word more than the name 'Cloud', and he had not expected the gunman to get any further than that this time either. "Vincent..." he almost, _almost_ laughed. "...what about you?" he frowned, "You don't look like you've gotten any shut-eye in months." the awkward feeling of accuracy Cloud felt for his own exaggeration, as if the words were drawn forth out of him my some outside force, disturbed him greatly.

The strange and almost forced warmness on Vincent's face momentarily vanished, so that his eyes and cheeks were sunken and skull-like once again, and his voice, rattling like dead leaves, hissed, "I don't sleep." As quickly as if someone had just turned darkened lights back on, the sweetness was back, but Cloud no longer believed it. He shuddered. If it weren't for the various tell-tale signs of onset (the twinge in his brain, the buzzing-ringing) he would've thought he was having another vision again... how could a person change so much in just an instant, and then change back? He didn't know... but felt, somehow, that he would have to be the one to find out.

"What do you mean you don't sleep?"

Like a ghost, Vincent moved around the room... circling, pacing. His rag of a tattered red cloak drifted lazily along behind him. "Too long I've slept." he said shortly, as if out-of-breath. "Too much time wasted in dreams. Dreams... dreams I never wanted, forced to have. Dreams I desired so, so much stolen away from me by the dark." he shriveled, pausing before the side of Cloud's bed, staring down at the obstacle in his way, then turning and walking around it until he was in the exact same place on the other side, smiling like a schoolgirl at the wall. "No more. I won't be trapped inside, in the dark anymore. There's sun now." he spun and pointed out the window, then at his own chest, "Sun and light, and I'm not going to miss a minute of it." he stood there, holding himself high and _smiling_, proud.

At this point, Cloud was sure. Sometime during the past seven years since he last saw him, Vincent Valentine must have gone _completely insane_. "Vincent..." he said slowly, approaching with care like he might do with a tame fiend or a rabid animal, "...at... at least relax?" he pleaded. "Sit down on the bed, or in the chair..." he indicated the seat by his desk, wishing more and more that he'd brought his sword out of the livingroom with him... though, to wield it against his own friend? The thought sent chills through his body. Oh, he'd done that before, for sure... and never again! No matter what the circumstances. "...or better yet. On the couch outside." he pointed past himself while coming in, "...so that I can get dressed."

Vincent frowned for a moment, it seemed, at the concept of being still. "What about breakfast?" he asked.

"What about it?"

"Are you hungry?"

Cloud paused. "...you cook?"

"Sure!"

On second thought, maybe _he_ was the one going insane. It had been known to happen, Cloud remembered darkly, then stuffed the unwelcome intruder back into the closetful of unwelcome things-passed he still kept in his mind. After all, it was an upside down world where Vincent Valentine cooked breakfast and smiled all the time... and, at once, Cloud couldn't help but somewhat enjoy it. If Vincent, of all people, could be smiling... surely something had at last gone _right_. His age-old paranoia and skepticisms told him otherwise, though, and barred him from pure relief. He sighed. "No thanks..." and shook his head, "...I'm not very hungry." and the gunman briefly looked disappointed as he headed for the door. The grace in his steps was gone, Cloud noted - a swordsman, and thus very aware of footing. It was like he couldn't decide between any one of three different gaits, and spontaneously flipped between them: a graceful glide, a timid shuffle, and a haughty march. Odd...

"How about something to drink?" the man asked casually.

For a moment, Cloud was hit in the face with a wall of grey, and his response came automatically: "Give me something hard." When the grey dissipated, Vincent was left standing there in the doorway, smirking triumphantly.

"Just a minute." he breathed, and disappeared down the hall, out of the doorway.

Cloud sighed, glad that the sudden pressure that had formed on his throat and forced him to talk was gone, along with the strange loss of vision.

...but wait, what?

With an almost pained growl, he sank down to his knees on the bed and set his head in his hands, fingers deftly gripping onto spikes of blonde. That dialogue. Those words. So familiar... but where? _Where_ did they come from? Why did he remember? Why did it seem as familiar as dejavu and at the same time, so very wrong? What was happening to him? This was different than a vision... it wasn't a Sight he couldn't force away, it was a sight that wouldn't come.

"Damnit." he hissed, struggling up to his feet and beginning to strip, throwing his armor into the cabinet by the door. "Can't I ever just have one problem at a time?" he tore off the ceremonial sleeves and pants with even more fervency, letting them fall to the ground, standing in boxers and a shirt in his room and just simmering for a while. _Or better yet..._ he thought, going over to the closet and picking out something comfortable, casual... good for a day of recovery: a big, plain T-shirt and sweats, some of the last remnants of the meager amount of things he'd brought with him from Edge. All the rest of his wardrobe had long since been replaced with more traditional Canyon garb. _...no problems at all._ but, of course, for Cloud Strife, this was unlikely, if not impossible.

At last he gathered up the fallen items and set them more carefully away, pausing briefly before the small mirror in his room to rake the rest of the beads out of his hair. Tossing them in the garbage can on the way out, he carefully closed his door and counted... first there was this nasty condition of the Sight, and how it _plagued_ him, and Nanaki wanted him to hone it, and he just wanted to get _rid_ of it, and _it_ wasn't too keen on either, and seemed perfectly happy to just reign free. Next there were his hidden memories. There were no more holes in his life, per se, just shadowy places that he cared not to look. Little patches on the street of his story covered in spikes that pierced him painfully every time he walked over them. All these things needed to be smoothed, paved over, and accepted, when just _discovering_ them in the first place had been such a task...

...his dark bubble of thinking was very suddenly burst when Cloud very nearly walked right into Vincent, waiting for him at the end of the hall with a steaming pot clenched tight in his metal hand and an empty mug in the other, wearing a leery smile and calling out "Coffee!"

...yeah. He stared. And then there was Vincent. Problem number three, and, it seemed, number _one_ on the priority list. He sighed and merely walked past the confused gunman. Some things were familiar, other things a mystery... one concrete fact Cloud knew: despite his earlier preference, whatever had compelled him to ask for 'something hard' certainly hadn't meant coffee anymore.

xxx

**Author's Ending Note Thingy:** Okay, hopefully a little bit of comic relief and WTF-ing in here. I was really glad for the reviews left on the last chapter, keep them coming! XD You guys all rock, who're still reading. It's just... yeah. Thanks.


	6. Laugh But Smile No More

Nanaki had disappeared.

This was not a good thing.

Of course the animal had not literally disappeared, Cloud knew exactly where he was: Bugenhagen's old observation tower, or one of the other buildings up there at the tippy-top of the Canyon... wherever he hid the hypothetical supercomputer or whatever means of contact he had with the outside world. The problem was in the fact that he had not come out yet. Cloud hadn't seen him since he'd been scolded the morning after the ceremony, about five days prior to now, when the creature had made a hasty retreat with the promise on his lips of researching Vincent's condition.

And there was that, too.

He desperately hoped that the delay meant the animal was merely immersed in seeking an explanation and cure for that, because it was certainly more complex than the swordsman had logically given it credit for. As it turned out, his old companion's moments of almost manic lucidity were few and far between... for which he was at first thankful, and then later regretted. The alternative was how Vincent spent his nights: curled up and shivering in whatever patch of moonlight he could find. Often that meant camping out in the middle of the floor in the livingroom... except on one evening when the woman that lived a story up had strung an assortment of bedding and clothes across the line outside the window to dry, effectively blocking all the light. This meant that the gunman instead sat huddled in the far corner of Cloud's room.

That night, Cloud didn't sleep. There was nothing he could do to comfort Vincent, though he tried (albeit halfheartedly), the gunman ignored almost all forms of contact, whether Cloud had a grip on his shoulder, a hand on his hand, or was attempting to drag him away from the moonlit spot. The last of the list, as it turned out, was the only thing that earned him any recognition at all, in the form of Vincent struggling like a feral cat and muttering something about 'keeping him caged'.

Cloud could hazard a guess as to who this 'he' was, and he found the thought of 'him' escaping a _very_ unpleasant one to fathom... though he had no idea what moonlight had to do with that. When he asked, Vincent shook his head. "Not the moon." he explained, pointing a rusted claw up to the celestial orb in the sky.

The blonde shook his head, "I don't understand..." he breathed, frowning, and holding his friend firmly in place against the wall with strong hands gripped around bent elbows.

Vincent sighed like a teacher might if they couldn't get a concept across to the class. Cloud knew _that_ sigh, heard it from Nanaki enough, and hated it. He hated feeling ignorant, uninformed, out of the loop. His _own life_ had made him feel like that for long enough, he didn't need it from others as well... But at last Vincent started to explain, his voice shaky and uncertain, as if afraid the odd word he spoke might cause something to strike out at him. "The cage is like the sun, but only in the day." his words were short and fast, his eyes gleaming dual colors of red and gold, the two swirling and mixing together as his speech further quickened and his voice rose in pitch, "The sun's not here, the cage is gone. It will come out in the night, it always does. Terrible... terrible things...!" he shook his head, and despite being pinned like a butterfly to the wall by Cloud's imposing strength, somehow returned to rocking back and forth like he had been until now.

So Cloud had not slept that night, with his murmuring, whimpering friend in the corner, there ("The massacre of Suns by Evening's sabers slain... escaping from the mind of man... an essence powerful to destroy, a soul that knew it well..." a million and one at-once disturbingly recognizable, sensical and yet still incoherent little phrases that had Cloud so unsettled...).

Vincent didn't seem to care if he came or went, so he did leave... There was only so much the boy could take. The greatest weakness of his, of all, was to watch another's suffering... to be helpless to do anything about it. And so he padded barefoot through the silent hallways of his home, arms crossed over his chest, trying to trick himself, for as long as he wasn't looking, that there wasn't anyone _right in his bedroom_ who needed saving. That Vincent, the pillar of rationality and strength of Avalanche, wasn't visiting him, was, instead, in some far-off mysterious place like his enigmatic personality suggested it was normal for him to be. _Wasn't_ twitching and sobbing and raving nonsense in the dead of night, curled up on a cold rock floor.

Daylight only granted Cloud a clearer view of his baggy eyes in the mirror, and the temporary, twelve-hour reprieve of external madness until nightfall.

Cloud soon realized that the best way to escape the constancy of Vincent's insanity was to simply go about his usual daily routine as if nothing were unusual. To not hover and attempt to pamper the disturbed gunman. He felt a little guilty, at first, leaving him sometimes... but that soon passed, especially after he realized that the gunman had started following him wherever he went anyway. Like a shadow, it seemed that even though his mind had gone, the skills of stealth he had left over from his last life as a Turk still remained.

He'd first noticed it on Wednesday.

Whatever chore the swordsman found himself responsible for, whatever urgent task somebody suddenly came up with for him to take care of, it could always wait until after Wednesday. With the life he'd lived for so long, Cloud was quite grateful for the luxury of routine. Back in Soldier, he'd relished it... there was nothing unexpected, every day he could count on getting up to do the same exact thing until he went to sleep. Some would call it mind-numbing monotony... he called it blessed security. So, now that he had the control to do so, he'd set aside one day a week to simply be away and alone, and to train.

His weapon, Ormen Lange, was fairly new... and though the size was familiar, the light weight of the blade was still strange, and he needed all the extra practice with it he could get. He was, after all, now an obligated second protector of the Canyon... he had to keep in shape, and couldn't allow his swordsmanship to get rusty, no matter how good he was with materia.

He'd been out on the grounds... or that's what he called them. The locals practically treated the place like the land was cursed, but the bowl within the crater formed by Ultima's impact ten years ago was open and free of obstacles - the perfect place to practice. Its limited access and removal from the main traffic patterns of the canyons made it empty and ideal... and the winding path that led from its far side to the secluded tropics bridging these canyonlands to the forest beyond occasionally enticed a wandering animal from up there to explore them. Once it had, however, the poor beast was as good as trapped, and Cloud ended up with a live target to hunt later.

It was on one such occasion that he'd gone down there, the day clear and bright with a red sun, that he'd heard the skittering of loose rock behind him. That was not so strange... some other animal must have had the misfortune to meander its way down into the rocks, and it was time he put it out of its starving misery. More light-footed than ever, the boy dodged about, attempting to appear uninterested as he very slightly modified his usual pattern of movement, scanning the crater floor with his eyes... but it was empty, completely clear of all track and trace that a distressed animal would leave behind.

Stumped, Cloud at last decided, perhaps against his better instinct, to cease his active search. Instead, while he swept gracefully from move to move in his memorized sword kattas, he kept a watchful eye out, and in time began to notice all the creeping shadows... the ones that lurked and watched him from between cracks of rock, the spiky blonde hairs standing up on the back of his neck, the unsettling prickle down his spine, the shreds of red cloak occasionally tossed about by the breeze, and likewise the raven hair, and sometimes, just sometimes the gleam of yellow eyes among the brick-colored sand. Patience, apparently, did still sometimes bestow its rewards upon its practicers.

When he finished for the day, the ex-Soldier stalked the ridge, until he came across, miraculously, Vincent Valentine completely by surprise. The gunman jumped and turned around when he realized the presence behind him, and pressed his back tightly to the raised edge of rocks, his expression mirroring one that might be found on a kid caught with his hand in a cookie-jar.

And Cloud, covered in red dust-stains, heaving for breath, and sweatyfaced merely gave him a reassuring smile that didn't seem quite sincere, and held out his hand to help the man up.

Confusedly, the gunman stared between himself and the blonde, switching his focus back and forth for a while as he considered... before eventually reaching out with his almost immobile claw and taking the hand. In an instant he was pulled to his feet, and soon enough found himself being dragged along behind Cloud, headed back toward the village.

Cloud didn't care. Just didn't. Not about anything at that moment, and though it seemed a dangerous concept, it was infinitely liberating. Cloud didn't care that Vincent had been following him... for whatever reasons he was doing so, if Vincent even needed reasons anymore... and normally he would seek to be silent on his treks back, so as not to alert any unwelcome attentions from the local fiends while he was tired from a long day's work. But not today.

Aside from the fact that his friend was likely in no condition whatsoever to fight at the moment, it was some kind of comfort to him that he had someone watching his back. That was the one plus-side to traveling with a whole large group. No-one was ever alone, and at the same time that was the downside as well. Though at the moment, Cloud felt a little nostalgic about it... and with Vincent's current state, the knowledge that he took any interest in anything was quite reassuring to the idea of his recovery. Cloud wouldn't stop him. If Vincent wanted to follow and watch, then he could follow and watch.

After it stopped being creepy, and once the local residents had gotten used to Cloud's second shadow, it became almost endearing... with the gunman slowly gaining more confidence over time (days, hours, not enough time to be classified as such at all, or perhaps the progress was just coming at an alarming rate), at first staying always behind the last corner, then staying several paces back and pausing in doorways, until finally he was walking directly behind or sometimes right beside the swordsman, saying nothing all the time. In fact, it seemed like the closer he got, the longer he went between bouts of strange behavior, and therefore the more he stayed silent. Cloud barely recognized the correlation, and was still nevertheless conflicted on how to feel about it.

On the one hand... he was glad the skittish gunman had begun to trust him... not to fear him when he seemed to fear everything else. On the other hand... he sometimes found the constant company stifling. When those circumstances didn't come into play, he never was sure which of the two seemingly polar personalities was Vincent. He'd seen both for long enough to realize that neither seemed to embody, or be influenced by any of the man's 'demons'... or whatever those inserts of Hojo's could be more properly classified as. At the same time, he was sure that one or more of them had some sort of hand in the situation his friend was in now.

All in all, he knew far too little to be making any assumptions... and Nanaki really needed to get his ass off the top of the mountain and report some findings, no matter how small.

-

Watching him move was mesmerizing. There was something so soothing about the actions, something that reached farther than the simple familiarity they had with eachother, developed from years of - albeit casual - friendship. It was more than just an acquaintance with the specific quirks of his gestures. It was something that struck a much deeper chord than the knowledge of his style of combat, picked up with piqued skills of observation, mandatory among members of the Turks, during the years of turmoil when they had first met, long ago.

Vincent sat in awe as Cloud worked down below, an almost dancelike performance of familiar sword-kattas, so deeply engrained into his muscle memory that he could fluidly pass through them with the casual grace of indifference and a placid look on his face. It took his breath away.

In fact... there was something about closeness to Cloud in general that just put Vincent at ease. Whenever he got too far away, he immediately became nervous, edgy... that terrible, look-over-your-shoulder paranoid feeling he felt a little guilty for possibly causing the swordsman to experience when he constantly tailed him all around the Canyon. Yet... Cloud never seemed to mind. Yes, he'd even been caught once or twice, sneaking, and it never mattered.

The thought almost made Vincent smile - almost - to think that he knew such a loyal friend. And yet...

...he couldn't shake the feeling... that he'd had that feeling before. Somewhere else, some_how_ else, with... some_one_ else. Yet approaching that idea always seemed to make him as equally uneasy as being away from Cloud did. So he stayed away from it, the cold dark snap in the middle of his mind, and focused on following his...

...heart. Somehow it didn't feel that way. Was it his to begin with?

Did it matter? Cloud didn't seem to care. Vincent still had the faint memory of setting himself a goal... a goal to reach Cosmo Canyon, to follow the yellow brick road, the sunlit way, the winding path of gold that had brought him all the way to this hidden corner of the world, and though the journey had been long and hard, and filled with fear... now he was happy. And happy wasn't a thing Vincent Valentine had felt in a long time.

They'd just gotten back, in fact, from Ultima's crater. Cloud had dragged him - gently - by the wrist all the way back at a wild, loping run, and now they sat on the cliff-edge actually _above_ the main village of the canyon, looking down on the giant, blind eye-like telescope that jutted out at an odd angle from the roof of the observatory.

The wind was whipping their hair in a flurry of black and gold, their clothing in a sea of blue and red. The sun was setting bloody over the auburn canyon and it made him uneasy, but... Vincent looked to his right, and Cloud was there. He couldn't help but smile, strained, breathless, but words still floated from his lips timidly, "I'm relieved you made it back safely." he said.

Cloud was enveloped in a swirl of grey. Vincent was speaking. How odd. "What's with you all of a sudden?" he asked back, automatic. "I mean..." And he had just spoken. How odd. "...I mean, where did that come from?" he gave a nervous (scared) half-laugh. They'd returned together... of course it had been safe.

Vincent shook his head. "Cloud, are you feeling allright?"

More grey. A spiral down into the pits of memory. Vincent was... talking so much all of a sudden. But he hadn't spoken a word in days! Cloud had enough consciousness left to realize this before replying "...yeah... why?"

"No reason." Vincent commented "You just look a little tired, I guess" he said with a shrug, turning nonchalantly back toward the thin line of light that still bubbled up, seeping over the horizon.

Cloud didn't know where he was... he was lost. As lost as he always was when he dredged up the murky muck of his past. Was it even his past? It couldn't be. It was happening right now. It was the present! But yet it felt so... Ancients, he just couldn't figure it out, and, while still blinded from the usually stunning Canyon sunset, lamely responded "You allright?"

"Of course!" Vincent automatically responded, even laughing slightly. Cloud shook his head roughly. He must be hearing things - shadows of a different time. Vincent didn't laugh... especially not now... did he? Sure enough, the gunman continued on into (what Cloud found to be a strangely familiar) "If you take me lightly, you're gonna pay for it!"

He looked up then, staring plainly into Vincent's torpid eyes. Perhaps it was the darkness behind his own, perhaps it was the growing twilight, but he thought he saw something there. Something that both made what was left of his heart jump with anticipation or joy, and stop cold with fear. No, not quite that bad. But then it was gone, before it even existed at all. What was he playing at? What was he sticking his fingers into, and what strange button deep inside himself, Cloud wondered, was Vincent pushing? As always... he just couldn't place it. But then there was something else. Something that definitely made him smirk grimly despite himself.

There was the sun... and there wasn't. Gone. It had set down behind the earth into night, and the gunman was still sitting here, nonchalantly, like he didn't care. Like all the screaming and shivering nights before hadn't existed. And it was the first time _this_ had happened. In some way... and it felt awful admitting it. Felt like he'd been treating Vincent like a pet all along, and especially now or something... but he seemed truly content, so it couldn't be that bad, could it? It couldn't possibly be bad that Cloud felt... proud of him. For the fact that he seemed to have, at least for now, conquered his bizarre fear. He laughed softly, out of that pride, at himself, at... hell, did he need a reason? What mattered most was that it was real.

Vincent, somehow, seemed to notice this - these. All the subtle changes and realizations on Cloud's face, as if they were written there as clear as day, and smiled. _Smiled_ - though... looking more deeply into it, the expression seemed almost... ferocious- and said, "It's allright." reassuringly, as if Cloud needed it. Or maybe he did... "Come a little closer."

Cloud was dumbfounded, his eyebrows raised, darkness swirling before his vision, strange images of other people, other places. "...wh-why?" he asked.

And it was back. In a flash, Vincent curled up like a dried flowerpetal next to a candleflame, gripping his knees with his hands, his eyes going dark, and muttered "...because I'm scared.", high-pitched and childlike under his breath.

With a sigh, unable to help being the least bit disappointed, Cloud nodded and stood up, throwing a hand around Vincent's shoulders and hauling him up to his feet. Something felt... oh forget it. He forced the flow of memories back down. They were only getting in the way. He had a job to do, for now, and that was to take care of his friend until he got better. "Come on." he said, looking up at the sky. It was clouding over. Crap. No moon tonight. This would be hard... "Come on, let's go back down." he said, leading Vincent toward the descending path from the edge.

"I'm going with you." the gunman said softly.

Cloud shook another sting of familiarity off and smiled (fakely), then laughed (real), "Yeah." he breathed, "You are."

---

**Author's Ending Note Thingy:** Okay, so... really long, right? Sorry. No-one's reading this one anymore... but that doesn't matter. I'm writing it because I love the story. I'm writing it for me. XD wow, I sound like a drama queen. Oh well, haha. Review if you like. Sorry this chapter's a bit boring, I didn't count on the beginning being so long, so the end had to get pushed to next chapter. I know what I'm doing, I swear!


	7. Knee Deep in Thunder

**Author's Beginning Note Thingy:** DISCLAIMER... Okay, we all know I'm a huge Vincent/Cloud shipper, and eventually this fic was bound to tempt me. Please note that any and all interaction in this chapter is treated in the most platonic way I can see possible. If I were writing this as slash, various reactions and conclusions would be much, much different. That said, read on!

xxx

Wisps of grey stormclouds were gathering in the East, and they were light and ashy in contrast to the swell of night sky also approaching from that direction. They acted weirdly, drawing closer and closer until they appeared to splat on an invisible wall, long arms fanning out to the sides creating a big circle around Cosmo Canyon. The roiling surfaces of these clouds chased eachother across the horizon like the ripples on a lake, like waves on the sea. They finally connected at the West end and swelled over, creating the effect of a big dome, a cloud-bubble, and the darkness became brighter with their covering.

The wind was whipping rather fiercely past by the time Cloud and Vincent made it to the main floor level in the Canyon village. The canvas doors of tents and eaves and roofs of windows in the outside market (which for the most part had packed up already, at dark) flapped wildly. Their shopkeepers began rapidly re-emerging from the warm safety of their homes to secure the various fabrics down, or roll them up and hide them altogether from the oncoming storm. The flames of the Cosmo Candle flickered and sputtered, but neither man either noticed or worried; they would not go out. That eternal firelight had weathered much worse weather, this would not make it so much as blink.

Vincent whimpered and clung with an iron-grip onto Cloud's arm as they ran, shoulders hunched in anticipation for rainfall. The first droplets hit when the swordsman first set boot on the stairs, and he swore silently. The downpour was instant and made every smooth rock surface immediately slick.

They made it without trip or stumble all the way to Cloud's door, and with a jingle of the keys, darted out of the wind and cold. For a moment both men just stood there, barely inside and dripping. The water seemed thick as goo as it ran out of their hair, down their clothes in veritable rivers. Eventually all the liquid pooled into a clear expanding circle across the sandstone floor at their feet. "Shit...!" the swordsman swore once he'd at last caught his breath and gotten ahold of himself, jumping into action. He found his way to the bathroom in the dark and pulled out a towel, dragging it through the house behind him (to cover his drips) before tossing it over the puddle he and Vincent had created.

The gunman still stood rooted to the spot where Cloud had left him, and looked up upon the boy's return, bewildered. The blonde took another moment to breathe and calm down before clearing his throat and surveying his companion again. He sighed. "You're flooding the place..." the swordsman tried to laugh, but the expression seemed so foreign to him that it came out more like a shivery wheeze. "Then again, so am I..." he at once began to strip off excess fabric... the detachable sleeves around his arms, the leather armor, belts and straps, leaving on only the basics - shirt and pants.

This process, for one reason or another, seemed to have Vincent momentarily enthralled... an opening which Cloud used to his advantage taking hold of his compliant arms and beginning to remove his wet layers as well, a worrying mother with their child who'd just been out playing in a rainstorm. "There..." he muttered to himself, at last satisfied by the time he'd worked off the soggy cloak, headband and jacket. "...you can do the rest?" he met eyes again with his friend confirming the man was capable. The gunman's various abilities, recently, flip-flopped from days when he could cook up a storm and make meals the likes of which Cloud had only tasted in the Seventh Heaven, and days when he sat in a fetal position in the corner of a room. Today seemed like an in-between, and Cloud only hoped that meant he was able enough to undress himself.

He wasn't entirely sure... but it seemed like Vincent had nodded, and that was a good enough answer for the moment. He padded across the dark livingroom again and partways down the hall beyond, turning into his bedroom. There, Cloud allowed the last of the soaked clothing he'd been wearing to fall to the ground with an unceremonious flop and set about replacing them with something dry and more comfortable. This done, he let himself fall prone onto the bed, his face buried deep into the feathery pillow. Maybe, he thought, if he just pressed hard enough and tried not to breathe, he could suffocate himself right here. It was a kind of morbidness the likes of which he'd managed to avoid experiencing pretty much since the Second Advent. Cloud wearied of lost causes all-too-easily, which given his repertoire of skin-of-the-teeth victories, was something one would expect him to have gotten over, but he hadn't. There was also something awful in the concept of writing Vincent off as a lost-cause already, hell he didn't even know what was happening yet... but it wasn't going away, and that was infinitely disheartening. It really _was_ like caring for a child... and wasn't this why he'd left Tifa?

Tifa...? Huh. How odd. He hadn't thought of her in... well, in years, at least. This realization came with a corresponding lightning strike which he could still see outlined by the shape of pillow caved around his face and the loud clap ob thunder that reached his ears. Somewhere back in the main body of the house there was a faint sound, rather like a mouse squeak, and then nothing. Cloud turned over to lie on his back, arms straight out to the sides, staring at the ceiling. It lit up suddenly again, and then the thunder came, sooner, closer. There was that same squeaking sound, then thudding footsteps and a thick shadow appeared in the doorway to his room.

His vision flashed, if only briefly, and Cloud immediately slammed the palms of his hands over his eyes in reaction. A vision?! Now? No! But nothing came... that telltale twinge in the back of his mind faded instantly away, and he even convinced himself that maybe it was the lightning. A panting at the end of his room lassoed his attention, and the swordsman slowly sat up, peering across the cozy distance to the lavalike eyes that hovered midair at the end of his bed. Vincent's shoulders heaved and shook, his breath coming in rolling waves. Another flash of light, another earth-rending crack and the gunman gasped, jumping, and pulling the door to slam shut behind him.

The blonde sat motionless and watching, dumb for a minute, as his friend pressed himself flush up against the far wall, bare chest heaving, barely visible in the thick atmosphere. Rain drummed down on all the outside surfaces, wind clattered through the shutters and howled through the eaves and down in the canyonlands like someone breathing over an open bottle, and all that symphony of nature almost drowned out the presence of Vincent in the room, if not for his eyes. They winked slightly, and then slid down toward the ground as he took a seat. A hand flashed up, blocking their hypnotizing, firelike light. He covered his face, almost as if in shame, and his shoulders shook with half-repressed sobs. At last, Cloud snapped out of his stupor and maneuvered over to the edge of the bed. "Hey..." he called.

Vincent didn't appear to hear him, in his own bubble of a world as usual. He sat curled up by the door, bare feet flat on the cold ground, back bent, mouth open, dripping. "Hey..." Cloud tried again, meaning to sound soothing... soothing like Tifa always had when she woke the children up for school.

And there she was again. Intruding on his thoughts. How? And why now, all of a sudden, when Vincent was here? He needed to concentrate on Vincent now...

Another flash sent the world into a comicbook-page pure black and white, and the immediate sound of thunder - like a gunshot (far too familiar) - got Vincent to his feet. He climbed and fell into bed beside the blonde, tangled himself in the blankets, clawing at every surface, scrambling to get away, oblivious to any obstacle. Said obstacle presented itself in the form of Cloud, throwing an arm out to the side to stop the gunman in his path, catch him like a net. This plan obtained the desired effect, and Vincent spun to face his friend, eyes wild, sucking in air like he was drowning. His skin felt cold and clammy against Cloud's arm, and he tried not to wince at the touch of it.

"Vincent." he said firmly. "What is going on?"

He wasn't sure if he expected a coherent answer... in fact, he knew he _shouldn't_ expect that. It was his fault for asking. "Help me..." the gunman wheezed weakly.

Cloud thought that was the most pitiful thing in the world... and it literally almost broke his heart to hear it. Another explosion of thunder overhead and it's accompanying lightning seared their eyes into white, and found Vincent clutching to Cloud's arm, wailing. The hot salt of tears strayed down the swordsman's bare skin, and before even thinking he reached out, putting a comforting arm around Vincent's back, drawing him in, shushing and rocking like he would for a child. "What's wrong?" he breathed as the darkness around him misted, turned to faded grey in strange patches. Not the work of lightning, nor the tricks of shadow... something else, something he couldn't quite focus on at the moment. His current task was too important.

"I can't get to sleep." he hissed, squeezing his eyelids shut, dark lashes ringed with diamondlike tears. It somehow put Cloud at ease to not have to look into his warped eyes, and (perhaps in selfishness) he lay a hand gently over Vincent's face as if urging him...

"Try." he replied.

Silence reigned for a little while. Almost-silence. The rain still rampaged over the rooftop, dull thunderclaps made themselves known outside along with sparks of skyfire here and there. Vincent's crying gradually ceased and his breathing evened, but he wasn't asleep. Cloud still sat stiffly in place, his mind as empty as the hollow air within the room. No full thought seemed to form... the world was still grey, he still felt like he wasn't quite altogether here... that a part of him was in another place at another time. The memory was familiar, and yet so odd and unattainable. The form in his arms was small, thin and fragile... he could feel the gentle brush of soft things against his bare skin, almost like velvety moss or leaves... but he knew it was just the sheets.

At last Vincent, in a quiet voice, dared again to speak. "I can't hold on forever..." he shivered, looking up again into the palm of Cloud's hand, the orange light shining around the outline soft pale flesh.

"What do you mean?" Cloud pressed, removing his hand and looking down sharply into Vincent's face. He stared back, impossibly scared. The thunder struck again, rolling over them like a wave, and something changed about his face in the lightning... the cracks of harsh light somehow softened it, filled the sunken cheeks and eyesockets out, plumped the lips, dimmed the eyes, and Cloud could almost recognize him again as something... something... someone...?

The swordsman almost gasped at the brief likeness, an unmistakable vision. There was that pressure at the top of his forehead, the singing in his brain. Vincent was lit from the inside by a yellow light, and outlined in blue, and the storm outside had nothing to do with that. It all happened in an instant, in a bolt of lightning - that was all. And time stretched on forever in that moment, and just as quickly it faded, and just as agonizingly slow.

He sat there dumbfounded, looking down at the gunman sprawled over his lap. "What are... Vincent..." he muttered, wide-eyed. "...a-are you...?" no, it couldn't be. It was crazy. And why, in the name of the ancients, _why_ was he thinking of Tifa at a time like this? "What is-"

But he was cut off, "Cloud..." the voice was calm and rational all of a sudden, a complete turnaround, and Cloud found himself wondering, perhaps even with reason, if this was even Vincent anymore. "...it's just an illusion. Don't worry about it." he affirmed.

"How did you know I-?" the blonde began, but was cut off by another crash, and whatever Vincent he'd just been speaking to was gone, back to huddling and hanging off his arm again. "Vincent..." he started hopefully, "...How did you know I... that I... that I Saw?" he asked, leaning over and speaking it like a secret, soft and almost directly into the gunman's ear.

With frightened eyes, again he looked up, and his stare was hard and unhappy. "The way you looked at me." he almost spat, as if offended, "Nobody looks at me like that... unless they See. Unless they See the truth. Nobody likes the truth. I hate that look."

The truth? What the hell did that have to do with anything? But before he could process the thought, Vincent put his head back down, resting it sideways across the swordsman's thigh. There was another flash, but its partner of sound came later. The storm was moving off already, and Cloud sighed with relief to know this ordeal was almost over. "...were you scared?" he softly asked, almost apologetic for having possibly upset the man, and hoping not to touch on any nerve or stomp more on Vincent's pride again (whatever he had just done).

There was no answer for the longest time, until came the smallest nod of the head, up and down, rubbing against his body as the only indicator that there was movement at all. Cloud smiled faintly at it, found himself inadvertently stroking a hand through the gunman's hair... his friend... just like a child.

"...finally asleep..." Vincent murmured, to which Cloud looked down at him questioningly.

"Not yet..." he muttered, slowly lowering his own body down to the bed, his head to the pillow, taking Vincent with him. The gunman was still captured securely in his arms and slid into place right beside him, his eyes deceptively closed, for Cloud could still see the faint slivers of orange light glinting out from under his eyelashes. "...you're not asleep yet, but soon. Just close your eyes." he lightly suggested.

Vincent shivered, "I don't want to sleep..." he said, his voice hushed and empty, "...I've been asleep so long, always in the background while the world goes on around me."

His sorrowed words were painful for Cloud to hear, but even now they were slurring with exhaustion, and the orange light flickered and went out. The swordsman sighed and tried his hardest to write off these latest maddened phrases as just that, nonsensical rambling... which seemed to be coming from Vincent with equal frequency to the sense of dejavu Cloud was getting... and it was frustrating. The last thing the blonde wanted to do was write his friend of as crazy... but he couldn't help but thinking that he made some sort of contribution to the situation, and he'd certainly had his fill of insanity in his life. "It won't." he muttered after this long, thoughtful pause, and he patted Vincent's back comfortingly. "The world won't go by anymore without you being a part of it. You'll get better, I promise. There's no rush."

The immediate dark between them lit up with fiery light yet again. Vincent's eyes were sad, but after a long hesitation, his lips curled into a faint smile. "I suppose..." he sighed, putting his head back down contentedly and closing his eyes for the last time that night, shutting out the flame, "...we still have time."


End file.
